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The council closed down and fenced off the Rivermead play park after vandals and travellers burnt the slide tower and other equipment and defecated there.

The park was locked up in October following a damning inspection by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (ROSPA).

But children fed up with waiting for the repair job are sneaking through the fences and playing on the dirty and burnt equipment.

The main brightly-painted tower is still boarded up and vandals have sprayed graffiti on it.

Some of the planks of wood on other features are splintered and litter is strewn about the play area.

The flimsy fences have proved easy for children to pull down and there are several gaps allowing them trouble-free access to the park.

One mother, Evening Post features editor Kate Magee of Caversham, spotted her seven-year-old son Jake slipping through the fence with a teenage childminder while she was in her Rivermead aerobics class.

She said: "I was horrified to find that children were quite easily going past the fence and playing on all the vandalised equipment. The park is filthy and nothing has been done to repair it yet. I had to rush out of my class and fetch my son. Who knows what accidents are waiting to happen there.

"I can't believe that it's not been repaired since October. Why hasn't the council spent money on fixing it yet? They must know that come the good weather children will want to play there.

"But if they can't fix it they can at least put up proper fencing to ensure that children can not get past. The current fences are no deterrent whatsoever".

"I expect that during the school holidays a park like that in a leisure area should be made safe and it is the council's responsibility to do so."

When the site was closed seven months ago, a spokesman for the council said proposals to replace the play area would take six months.

A council spokeswoman said that an announcement about the long-term plans for the playground's renovation will be made "very soon".

Jon Hartley, lead councillor for leisure services, said the cost of the renovation will run into six figures.

He said: "We had always planned to remove the unsafe equipment and in light of the report that children may be attempting to use it we will have it removed as soon as possible, hopefully within the next fortnight.

"In the meantime all efforts will be made to secure the site."

The play park, off Richfield Avenue, was installed in 1988 and is set up like an obstacle course with different-sized wooden towers linked by ropes where children can slide across on pulleys.